Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Unfortunately, I forgot my camera (can you believe it?) on this 10-mile
hike, but here are a few crappy cell phone pics of the hike, and a little play-by-play. The trailhead is at the top of Lake Avenue in Pasadena. Go past the Cobb Estate gate, stay to the right and look for the signs to Echo Mountain. We started at 7:45am and got up to the Echo Mountain ruins in an hour. From there we took the San Merrill trail, up and up and up...

Here's the view from about 3.5 miles:

...with white rock mountains above:

Neat burnt trees, and a view of the northern valley:

We were above the helicopters!

My hiking friend Mithra!

Sunset Point:

A nice shady path for about a mile to the fire road:

At the fire road, basically the 5-mile mark:

Finally at Inspiration Point!

There were some picnic tables, and of course the "telescopes" (basically just metal tubes).

We looped back down the Castle Canyon trail, which is a skinny trail to the left as you're facing the Inspiration Point sign.

We found a little creek which was heavenly in the heat!

The Castle Canyon trail ends just 10 feet south of the junction to the San Merrill trail. You can take either one up, but I think the route we did was the best, because the heat was worse as the day went on, and the Castle Canyon was slightly more shade and a bit steeper.

The hike was wonderful! It took us about 5 hours. We finished around 1pm. The last 2 miles were the most brutal because we were tired, out of water, and it was high noon with insane heat. So warning to the wise: Bring about 6 liters of water for 2 people and a dog!

I would definitely recommend this hike! It is difficult, so make sure you are healthy and willing, and the weather is cool!

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

You walk through a residential neighborhood for a little while, then the trailhead is on your left after a little less than a mile. The first 2 miles is pretty easy to get to the lower falls.

Then you can scramble rocks and use some rope-climbs to get up to the upper falls:

The upper falls:

The rock-climbing was difficult, but fun. You can climb even further than the upper falls, but once you get up to the view of the whole valley, turn around from there.

There is a trail at this view to get back down to the rope climb, but DON'T take it! It is far too slippery and dangerous, just go back down the way you came. The waterfall was beautiful, but not very full. I would probably suggest going in the spring after a rainy season. I would definitely recommend this hike. It is not too difficult if you opt out of seeing the upper falls. It was really nice and we had plenty of time for a picnic on the beach afterwards. For more pictures, you can click this link: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150420774787846.446553.527707845&l=9c716b9bd5&type=1
Just another beautiful Los Angeles day!

Thursday, August 25, 2011

I can't believe how fast time flies! It's been a while since my last post, I guess I've just been busy.
Sam and I started a bar-tending class together. It's been a fun way to spend our Saturdays this month. I've been hiking, taking photographs, working on the house, and listening to lots of music, per usual. So there are some posts to come! But in the mean time, enjoy these pictures of Rita in some Activision swag:

Wednesday, August 03, 2011

Two Sundays ago, I had the joy of spending the day with the Johnsons, hiking Cold Spring Trail in Santa Barbara. We didn't make it to the base of the waterfall because there was a lot of steep rock climbing towards the end, but it was still beautiful.